Medical microbiology

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Medical microbiology is both a branch of medicine and microbiology which deals with the study of microorganisms including bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites which are of medical importance and are capable of causing diseases in human beings.^{[1][further explanation needed]} It includes the study of microbial pathogenesis and epidemiology and is related to the study of disease pathology and immunology.

This branch of microbiology is amongst the most widely studied and followed branches due to its great importance to medicine.

Along with providing a deep knowledge and understanding of the nature of pathogens this line of study has also been applied in several immunological innovations in the field of medical science. Through the development of vaccines against invading organisms, deadly and debilitating diseases such as small pox, polio, and tuberculosis have been either eradicated or are more treatable because of the efforts of scientists and researchers in the field of medical microbiology.

Fields of medical microbiology

There are fours fields in medical microbiology :

• Medical bacteriology
• Clinical virology
• Medical mycology
• Medical parasitology (Some parasites are not considered as microbes because of their size)

Work organization

The discipline consists primarily of four major spheres of activity:

1. The provision of clinical consultations on the investigation, diagnosis, and treatment of patients suffering from infectious diseases.
2. The establishment and direction of infection control programs across the continuum of care.
3. Public health and communicable disease prevention and epidemiology.
4. The scientific and administrative direction of a diagnostic microbiology laboratory.

In addition to these primary activities, medical microbiologists are also involved in teaching at all levels, and in research, both basic and applied.

Clinical microbiology residency

In France

This residency is included in "clinical pathology" residency as a sub-specialty, which can be chosen at the end of the first two years of residency.

In United States of America

Medical doctors can participate in a Medical Microbiology training fellowship that is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) after they have completed residency training in pathology or fellowship training in infectious diseases.^[2] Others with non-medical doctoral degrees can participate in a similar training fellowship that is accredited by the Committee on Postgraduate Educational Programs (CPEP)^[3]. As of 2010, 12 training hospitals in the United States offer Medical Microbiology fellowship training:

• Yale-New Haven Medical Center [3]
• Emory University [4]
• Indiana University [5]
• University of Iowa [6]
• Johns Hopkins [7]
• Harvard (Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center) [8]
• Mayo Clinic [9]
• Duke [10]
• Cleveland Clinic [11]
• University of Pennsylvania [12]
• University of Texas Southwestern [13]
• University of Utah [14]

According to Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME)[15], the University of Pennsylvania no longer offers the Medical Microbiology fellowship. However, the University of Chicago does now offer this fellowship, but no web reference to the fellowship is available on the University of Chicago's website.

See also

• List of human diseases associated with infectious pathogens

References

1. ^ Tognotti E. (2011). "The dawn of medical microbiology: germ hunters and the discovery of the cause of cholera". Journal of Medical Microbiology. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21212146. 
2. ^ [1]
3. ^ [2]